Rhode Island
Finals set in Rhode Island Junior Amateur golf tourney. Here’s who’ll play for the titles.
PAWTUCKET — Olivia Williams will bid for a third consecutive title and three fellow finalists will be in search of their first entering the last day of the 105th Rhode Island Junior Amateur.
Lily Dessel, Jesse Hellring and Brayden Dickinson all hope to join the party at Pawtucket Country Club. Thursday’s semifinals saw the top two seeds advance for the girls and the upsets continue for the boys.
More: More drama at the Rhode Island Junior Amateur quarterfinal match play. Here’s what happened.
Williams rallied past Adriana Eaton, 3 and 2, while Dessel won the first two holes on each side to beat Claire McTaggart, 2 up. Hellring won the 16th and 17th holes to top Rocco Capalbo, 3 and 1, while Dickinson survived the final two holes to outlast Ian Dunham, 1 up.
Eaton won the first two holes and three of the first six to hold a 2-up lead before Williams kicked into gear. She made par to take the seventh and birdie to capture the ninth, pulling level at the turn. Williams won four of five holes between the 12th and 16th to close it out, bracketing that stretch with two more birdies.
“I started to come back toward the end of the front nine and I went up on the beginning of the back nine,” Williams said to the Rhode Island Golf Association. “I was just trying to stay focused, play my game and take one shot at a time.”
Williams could see Eaton again next week at the Women’s Amateur. They’ve played for the state’s biggest prizes in recent years, including a meeting in last year’s final and a matchup in the Junior Amateur semifinals. Both are Interscholastic League stars at La Salle Academy and Moses Brown, respectively.
“She’s very good,” Williams said. “It was a tough match today. We definitely have a lot of fun when we play together.”
Dessel reached the quarterfinals in her 2021 debut at this event and has improved her game steadily since then. She never trailed against McTaggart but couldn’t build more than a 2-up lead against her Barrington High teammate and fellow Rhode Island Country Club member. Dessel won the 18th with a routine par to book a spot in her first final.
“It took me a while today to figure out the speed of the greens,” Dessel said. “It was definitely faster than the past couple of days. Once I got that going, I was kind of steady for the rest of the match.”
Hellring’s bogey was good enough to win the par-4 11th, and he carried a 1-up lead to the 16th after halving six of the previous seven. Two straight pars were enough to slip past Capalbo, the reigning Interscholastic League champion who’s fresh off a strong debut at Prout. Hellring avoided the 18th hole for second time in three matches, playing it only during a 1-up win over Joey Iaciofano in the Round of 16.
“Winning this would be great,” Hellring said. “What you get as well — going to the U.S. Junior [Amateur] would be awesome.”
Dickinson was one of the last players to reach match play as the No. 15 seed and has made the most of his chance. He lost the 16th hole with a bogey to trail late, but that’s a minor inconvenience at this point for the North Kingstown standout. Dickinson was sidelined for the end of spring and beginning of summer after suffering an ankle injury in physical education class at school — he’s just now rounding back into form.
“It really put into perspective how much this game means to me, how much I really just love coming out here and competing with the guys and putting together a good score,” Dickinson said. “It was a tough couple months.”
Hellring and Dickinson will open their finals match at 7:30 a.m. Williams and Dessel will have the tee eight minutes later. Two other matches also will go off in the boys first division and boys 14U — Connor Ahlborg and Conner Rabbitt in the first, Aidan Connell and Raj Mammen in the second.
Boys championship
Jesse Hellring def. Rocco Capalbo, 3 and 1; Brayden Dickinson def. Ian Dunham, 1 up.
Girls championship
Olivia Williams def. Adriana Eaton, 3 and 2; Lily Dessel def. Claire McTaggart, 2 up.
Boys first division
Connor Ahlborg def. Luke Cavanaugh, 3 and 1; Conner Rabbitt def. Zachary Taraian, 2 and 1.
Boys 14U
Aidan Connell def. Mitch McTaggart, 3 and 2; Raj Mammen def. Nico Capalbo, 4 and 3.
bkoch@providencejournal.com
On X: @BillKoch25
Rhode Island
RI GOP asking for resident input for upcoming Washington Bridge oversight hearing | ABC6
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WLNE) — Rhode Island Republican leaders are asking for public input ahead of an upcoming oversight hearing on the Washington Bridge forensic report.
The report, recently revealed to have been withheld by Governor Dan McKee at attorneys’ advice, will be the subject of the planned November 13 oversight hearing.
McKee stated that he knew that repairs were needed on the bridge for two years before its December 11, 2023 westbound side closure, but was confident that work was underway.
McKee said that once he was aware the bridge deficiencies were irreparable, he approved the closure.
Rhode Island House Minority Leader Michael Chippendale said in a statement, in part:
Now that the Speaker and Senate President have committed to ‘a thorough and rigorous examination’ of the Washington Bridge failure and have empowered the Joint Oversight Committee to take testimony under oath, Rhode Islanders deserve answers without delay on this on-going administrative disaster.
Residents can contribute questions to the hearing process via email at rigopcaucus@gmail.com.
Rhode Island
Smithfield’s response to anti-Semitic hazing incident is ‘egregious,’ Jewish Alliance says
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The mother of a Jewish football player told the Jewish Alliance of Greater Rhode Island that five Smithfield football players, all seniors, trapped her son in a bathroom and sprayed him with Lysol while yelling anti-Jewish slurs, according to a representative of the alliance.
The Alliance staff member, Stephanie Hague, says the woman told her the entrapment involved a chair pushed against a door, but it wasn’t clear from the woman’s comments if her son was trapped in a bathroom, or in a particular area of a bathroom.
Hague said she could not further clarify the specific circumstances of the Lysol-spraying but as she understood it, the player was exposed to the spray during the entrapment and other hazing.
Did the Smithfield football players use anti-Semitic slurs?
“The reason I am not sharing the slurs is because they are, one, not suitable for print, but also because there is some dispute of exactly the phrasing,” said the Alliance’s president, Adam Greenman.
“But we do know that they were anti-Jewish, anti-Semitic slurs and the incident was witnessed by 20 other football players,” Greenman added.
Hague said that Greenman’s comment is “correct.” She emphasized that she is not a lawyer or police investigator, but as part of her job at the Alliance, she responds to matters of antisemitism.
Greenman said the organization has talked to the student’s mother and to others who witnessed what took place.
“We feel fairly confident that we understand the details of what happened,” he said.
Alliance putting public focus on district’s response to the incident
Hague and Greenman made those comments on Monday, Oct. 27 as the student’s mother and the Jewish Alliance made plans to bring attention to the situation at an anticipated meeting of Smithfield’s school committee.
Both the Alliance and the Sandra Bornstein Holocaust Education Center have condemned the school district’s handling of the incident, asserting that five seniors were initially kicked off the team but were then reinstated to the team on Wednesday, Oct. 22.
The players’ return to the team was in time to participate in Friday night’s game against Exeter-West Greenwich/Prout, which the team won 16-6.
On Thursday, Oct. 23, the school district’s Superintendent Dawn Bartz, gave a one-sentence statement in an email seeking comment on the situation: “The disciplinary process has concluded, and we will not be discussing details involving students.”
“The fact that the school district has reversed course on consequences for the students is just egregious,” Greenman said.
“We all know that if a consequence is taken away for something like this, it encourages that behavior moving forward,” he said. “We’re very concerned that the students involved were reinstated. We’re very concerned that it seems like the school district is not taking this seriously.”
Meeting canceled hours after Jewish Alliance encourages public attendance
Later on Monday, it became clear that Smithfield Town Council had canceled its Tuesday, Oct. 28, joint session with the School Committee.
An executive assistant to the town manager in Smithfield confirmed that the meeting had been canceled, noting that there are plans to reschedule the meeting, but no date has been set at this time.
The town clerk later said that based on the volume of queries from members the public and news media, the town determined it needed to move the joint meeting from the Town Council’s chambers to a larger venue, according to Donna Corrao, who is an executive assistant for Town Manager Robert W. Seltzer.
The cancellation came hours after the Alliance sent a press release encouraging the public to attend the meeting to “express your outrage and desire to act” after a “horrific antisemitic hazing incident at Smithfield High School.”
The Alliance had encouraged people to:
- Attend in support and solidarity
- Share brief testimony if you have a strong connection to Smithfield or a compelling personal experience to contribute
- Hold signs and wear pins, which would have been available at the meeting.
Rhode Island
Special Olympics Rhode Island celebrates completion of sixth Law Enforcement Torch Run | ABC6
SMITHFIELD, R.I. (WLNE) — Special Olympics Rhode Island said it celebrated the completion of the sixth annual Law Enforcement Torch Run at its Fall Festival Sunday.
Organizers said the 70-mile, 24 hour run raised funds and awareness for Special Olympics athletes in the state.
The six members of law enforcement who took part in the run were:
- Jim Baum, Founder of the 24-HOUR SUPER WALK and Assistant Attorney General at the Rhode Island Office of Attorney General
- Zachary Coyne, Police Officer, City of Warwick
- Eric Leclerc, Founder of the 24-HOUR SUPER WALK and Police Detective, City of Cranston
- Mark Lindberg, Field Scientist for Cytiva
- Sarah McNulty, Police Officer, City of Central Falls
- Kerri McWilliams, Correctional Officer, Department of Corrections Women’s Division
The over $10,000 raised by the event will go towards the organization’s sports, health, and leadership programs.
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